Download Climate change and agriculture in Africa – analysis of knowledge

ClimDev-Africa
Climate change and agriculture in Africa –
analysis of knowledge gaps and needs
Tom Owiyo
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Outline
• Introduction
• Agriculture in Africa -challenges and
opportunities
• Critical issues for the UNFCCC
• In Durban
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Introduction
• Average contribution to GDP – 15 %, up to 50 %;
• Persistently underperformed for much of the past
half century;
• Between 1998 and 2008, number of hungry people
increased by 20%;
• Yield decline: 1967 to 2007, farm output decreased
in Africa (by 30%), increased South Asia (x2) and
in East Asia (x3);
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Why the poor performance?
• Low investment by African governments:
– Africa = 4% of budget; Asia = 14%
• Rain-fed: only 6.5% of African farmland irrigated; Asia =
40%
• Low use of fertilizers per ha = Africa 10 times (10 kg) less
world average (110 kg), 20 times less than Europe
• Post harvest grain losses = USD 4 bn/yr (15% of output)
• Other challenges: natural resource degradation (land, soils
and soil nutrients); lack of access to credit.
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Opportunities for African agriculture
• Global population – 9 bn by 2050, food production
needs to increase by 70% (USD 83 bn annually)
• Rising incomes and changing diets
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Opportunities for African agriculture
• Large untapped agricultural potential – over 60% of
cultivable in Africa (31% in Latin America)
Sources: FAO, IFPRI, Standard Bank Research
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Climate change
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The UNFCCC Objective
Article 2:
The ultimate objective of this Convention … is to
achieve … stabilization of greenhouse gas
concentrations in the atmosphere at a level that
would prevent dangerous anthropogenic
interference with the climate system. Such a level
should be achieved within a time frame sufficient …to
ensure that food production is not threatened…
Impact on African Agriculture
• Monumental challenges to crops and
animals through: temperature and rainfall
• Biological organisms and their physiological
processes
Up to the 4AR
• Very broad impact of CC on agricultural productivity
in different parts of the continent, mainly through
Climate change impacts: IPCC 4AR
Possible changes in rainfall
and storms
Changes in water availability
coupled to climate change
Changes in ecosystem range
and species location
Desert dune shifts
Agricultural changes (e.g.
millet, maize)
Changes in health possibly
linked to climate change
Conflict zones
Sea-level rise and possible
flooding in megacities
Temperatures rising and yields falling
• Current average temperatures across the globe are
0.74°C above the historical reference year of 1905.
• An average warming of 1.5°C above historical
temperatures is expected by 2050.
• For Africa, 2010 was the warmest year on record.
Temperatures averaged over Africa were 1.29°C above
the long‐term average.
• From 1980‐1998, global maize and wheat yields have
decreased by 3.8% and 5.5% respectively due to increasing
temperatures.
Threats from extreme events and slow onset
temperature rise
• “Temperature changes have a much stronger impact on
yields than precipitation changes.”
• Climate extremes will become much more common, with
“relevant temperature thresholds for crops … to be
exceeded on more days in most regions.”
• “The majority of African countries will have novel
climates over at least half of their current crop area by
2050.”
Stanford University Program on Food and Environment
Observed and projected averaged
summer temperatures for the Sahel
(Battisti and Naylor 2009)
Three policy questions to
consider
• Global goal: 1.5 or 2°C?
• Prioritizing adaptation: how?
• Addressing mitigation smartly
Global goal: 1.5 or 2°C?
• Crop yields: higher T has linear effect on crop yields up to
a threshold, beyond which, crop yields drop dramatically:
– Pollen: viability decline (Barnabas, 2008; Hatfield, 2008)
– Seed development: embryonic development may cease (Klueva et.
al., 2001; Maestri, 2002)
– Photosynthesis: reduced (Barnabas, 2008).
• Livestock sector: behavioral and metabolic changes,
reduced quality and quantity of feed, reduced feed intake,
decline in productivity (Thornton et al., 2009).
• Food security is clearly threatened by CC in the relatively
near term (Lobell, et. Al. 2008).
Prioritizing adaptation
• Adaptation of agricultural systems must be a central and
immediate concern of country‐level planning, regional
cooperation and international finance.
• AGN should actively engage in the negotiations and
ensure that no window compromises the ability of African
countries to produce exploit its potential in this sector.
• The UNFCCC Adaptation Framework could include a
specific work program on agriculture, similar to the work
program on loss and damage.
• African countries need finance, technology transfer and
capacity building
Addressing mitigation smartly
• Agricultural emissions from developed countries are 2‐3
times those from African countries.
• Mitigation markets will not be a stable or predictable
funding source for African agriculture
• Soil carbon markets may actually threaten future
production
– Offset markets require continued emissions elsewhere
– Reversal of C sequestered in soil and trees as temperature rises
What happened in Durban?
• AW-LCA – as a mitigation element under “cooperative
sectoral approaches and sector specific actions”.
Question: whether to open a WP on agriculture under the
SBSTA in the context of Convention’s Article 4.1(c)
• Adaptation Framework, NAPs, Nairobi WP, Program on
Loss and Damage and the Adaptation Committee
• REDD-plus – agriculture not explicitly mentioned.
Decision 1/CP.16: directs Parties to address drivers of
deforestation though an SBSTA WP and to report to COP
18 on findings
• No Work Program on agriculture came out of
Durban
• LULCF decision negotiated under the AWG - KP
(Decision 2/CMP.7) opened four programs of
work that could have a bearing on agriculture:
– explore more comprehensive LULUCF accounting
– develop modalities and procedures for additional
LULUCF activities to add to CDM
– consider alternatives to non-performance of CDM
– develop and recommend procedures for applying
concept of additionally
Thank you
ACPC
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